ARI Working Paper Series

This paper explores the impact of migration for domestic work on two categories of children. The first category is of children who have been ‘left-behind’ by mothers migrating overseas to undertake paid domestic work. The second category is of children whose mothers employ foreign domestic workers to care for them since early childhood because they themselves are employed in demanding jobs.

In the light of the debate sparked by a photograph of a young Singaporean soldier with his foreign domestic worker trailing behind him and carrying his backpack in March 2011, this paper explores how state policies and state and public discourses in Singapore have contributed to the rise of these two categories of children. It examines the relationship between globalisation, the changing notion of what it means to be a ‘good mother’ and the commodification of childcare.

Drawing upon scholarly literature, state policies, discourses and media reports, this paper argues that both the left-behind and cared-for children pay a significant emotional price as a result of globalisation and their mothers’ decision to engage in paid labour; and it is not clear that the cared-for children are indeed better off than left-behind children because they are on the receiving end of commodified care. It suggests that more scholarly research on the impact of maids as carers on cared-for children is needed.